F 159 
.B5 R33 
Copy 1 



isfamm 



B5R33 



SECOND EDITION. 






1^ THE OLD SUN lO, 



BETHLEHEM, PA 



« 




Class i^\^^ 

Book .;MSi^ 



THE 



OLD SUN INN, 



AT 



BETHLEHEM, PA 
1758. 




NOW THE 



v^ SUN HOTEL. 



AUTHI 



HlSTOF\Y. '(Yrt «■■■ 



%\ 



KY TRE AirTHOK OF "a RED ROSE FROM THE OLDKN TIMR, 
SAR BETHLEHEM 
.," ETC., ETC. 



THE CROWN IKN, NEAR BETHLEHEM,'^ 

"the old mill," etc., etc. v^ 1 



D O Y L E S T O W N , PA.: 

W. W. H. DAVIS, PRINTER. 



1876. 
Co 



The following historical sketch of the tirst house of 
entertainment at Bethlehem is based upon materials that 
were carefully drawn from authentic records in the 
archives of the Moravian Church at that place. While 
it treats of a house whose antecedents are perhaps unique, 
the narrative may serve to throw additional light upon 
the past of a place which is confessedly rich in historical 
associations. 

Bethlehem, Pa., February 1, 1876. 




'■;ii i?||: !•«■ 1 1 lis 




I i"i iTTFPiiL^ 



iSfl PI i IP 




THE SUN INN, 17^8 




THE SUN HOTEL, 1816, 



PROPRIETORS AND LANDLORDS 

OF thp: 

SUN INN. 



L THE MORAVIAN SOCIETY, 1758 t<, 1851. 
Landlonls for the Societf/—^J* eter Worbas. 

" " Jasper Payne, 

" " J. Andrew ALHitianT. 

" " Just Jansen. 

" " Abraham Levering, 1<S(H). 

" "• John Lennert. 

" " Christian (i. Pauli's. 

" " Joseph Rice. 

" " Jacob Wolle. 

" " Matthkw Christ. 

" " George Etherton, 1880. 

" '• Samuel Ziegler. 

" " C. Edward Seidel. 

" " Preston Brock. 

" " TiLGHMAN RUPP. 

" " George Shober. 

2. CHARLES A. LUCKENBACH and 
JOHN ANDERSON, 1851. 

Lundioid — James Leibert. 

3. JAMES LEIBERT. 

4. RUFUS A. GRIDER. 

5. CHARLES BRODHEAD, 1 8«J8. 

Landturds — John R. Johnson. 
" RiEGEL and Sandt. 

'" Cyrus T. Smith. 



THE SUN INN, 

AT 

BETHLEHEM, PA. 
1758. 



LMOST forgotten, and l)y tnost unheeded, (iu as 
far as its stone walls have been cunningly assimi- 

p^ lated with the brick and mortar of the modern 
structure with which it is incorporated) — there still stands 
as part and parcel of the Sun Hotel in the borough of 
Bethlehem, — the fii"st house of entertainment that was 
built by the Moravians within the limits of their earliest 
settlement in the Province of Pennsylvania. 

What of history the Sun Inn has made, or what of 
history made by others it rightly claims, it is the design 
of these pages to briefly rehearse. 

When the ]\Ioravians commenced the building of 
Bethlehem in the spring of 1741, and for several years 
subsequent, such was their remoteness from the routes of 
travel in south-eastern Pennsylvania, as to render the 
erection of an Inn altogether unnecessary. It is true, in 
1745 they blocked n]> an hnnible hostelry on land of 
2 



10 THE SUIS" INN AT BETIILKIIE.M. 

theirs in Saiicon township, (it stood until the summer of 
1856 on the right bank of the Lehigh, where the Unioii 
Depot of the two railroads stands,) which, for a time, 
satisfied the wants of the few who were occasionally led 
by business to enter the wilderness within the Forks of 
Delaware. But with each passing year a stronger tide 
of settlement set in northward from the more populous 
parts of the Province and also from abroad. Hereupon, 
fiirms began to dot the country on every side, new roads- 
were opened, and ere long the capital came to be con- 
nected by succcessive links that led through the heart of 
Northampton county with the ancient Minisink Road, 
whose outlet Avas Kingston on Hudson's River — and be- 
yond, by a second chain of thoroughfares, with the busy 
towns east, as far as Massachusetts Bay. Bethlehem thus 
became a point in this great artery of travel, and situate 
moreover, on the through-line from New York to Balti- 
more and the Carolinas, the necessity of making provision 
for wayfiirers, moved its people, in time, to erect an Inn 
more commodious than the one located on the south side 
of the ri\er. 

Accordingly, in July of 1754, the matter was given 
into the hands of a committee fur full consideration. 
These reported on the eighteenth day of that month to 
the effect that they had fixed upon an eligible site for a 
public house, on the outskirts of the town, described by 
them as "situate on the road leading to the tile-kiln, and 
opposite the Manockasy and the quarry." From the 
enor of these words the reader will rightly infer that 
Bethlehem was then an incont^ideral)lc village. In fact, 
the pile of stone houses on Church Street, the center of 



THE SUN IXN AT BETHLEHEM. 11 

tlie Young Ladies' Seminary, the farm-buildings clustered 
around the first-house,* tiie mills and workshops on the 
Manockasy, a single dwelling on Market Street, and a 
second in course of erection for families and subsequently 
used as a school, (the Moravian Publication House has 
recently supplanted it,) — constituted all there was, in July 
of 1754, of the busy little settlement with a population of 
four hundred souls. With the above report, the labors 
•of the aforementioned committee ceased for the time, and 
when in Febuary of 17oo, the matter of erecting an Inn 
was again agitated, it was resolved to postpone further 
action in the premises, until the completion of the Hallf 
on tlie Barony, or Nazareth Tract. Thus passed the sum- 
mer of 1755, and then came the Indian war. This, as is 
well known, entailed upon the Moravians serious pecuni- 
ary losses, and for several j'ears paralysed their domestic 
■activity as well as their missionary enterprise, llencc 
•the building of the Inn was further delayed. Finally, in 
the late autnnm of 1757, preparatory steps were taken to 
commence the work in the ensuing spring, and in Janu- 
ary of 1758 the arch-iteet's draft was submitted to the 
committee for inspection, approved and accepted.^ The 

* This stood until the autumn of 1823, in the rear of the Eagle Hotel. 
The farm yard which, with its buildings occupied a rectangular plot in 
front of the first house extending as far cast as the line of Main street, 
was not fiilly removed until in 1771. 

t Built for his residence, in expsctation of Count Zinzcndorf 's return 
to Pennsylvania, but subsequently used as a school. A Boarding 
School for Young Gentlemen was opened in Nazareth Hall in October 
of 1785. 

X This draft, entitled " Bau JZt'.--.5 su einem Gemein Login," is hanging 
framed, in the reading-room of the Hotel, and is an admirable specimen 
of the draftsman's art. The front elevation shows quite an imposing 
structure. '»') by 4ii feet, of two stories, surmounted by a heavy double or 



12 THE SrX INX AT P.KTin.EIfEM. 

lion&e having been staked off in accordance witli this plan, 
and so as to have its end range with the front of a stone 
stable that had been erected hjwer down the street in tlie 
sunnner of 1757,* ground was broken in the first week of 
April, and the cellars excavated and walled out before 
the close of May. But during the ensuing eighteen 
months, tlie work at the building was alternately inter- 
mitted and resumed, so that the spring of 1760 opened, 
and travelers were still lodged on this side of the river, 
when the weather was inclement, in what was called 
"The Indian House," that stood on the right bank of the 
Manockasy, opposite the grist-mill. 

On the 24th of March, 1760, Peter and Ann ^Mary 
Worbas,! (last from Gnadenthal Farm,) occupied apart- 

Mansard roof, the front facing soutli — with six windows and a door in 
the first story, seven windows in the second, and four dormer windows 
in the third under the lower pitch of the roof. The first floor is divided 
by a hall 12 feet wide, into four apartments, as follows : on the left, in 
I'ront, a reception room 24 by 10 feet ; in the rear of this an apartment 
of like dimensions, divided, however, into two rooms ; on the right of 
the hall, front, the landlord's oflice and dwelling room, and in the rear 
a kitchen and pantry. The southwest end of the second floor is occu- 
pied by a dining saloon 37 by 18 feet, flanked by a suite of three apart- 
ments, two suites of like arrangement filling up the remainder of the 
floor. The third story is divided into four rooms, and four alcoves or 
recesses, each of the latter being large enough to contain four bedsteads. 
The draft also shows an end elevation of the house, and a profile and 
plan of the cellar. Although the details of this design were originally 
carried out, they were subsequently slightly modified, and decidedly so 
in 1824, during the incumbency of Jacob Wolle, the then landlord. 

* "Converted about 1820 into dwellings, the last of which was demol- 
ished only recently, to make way for a row of modern stores. At this 
writing the farmer's house, too, is being demolished, so that every ves- 
tige of the buildings that at the beginning of the century surrounded 
the yard of the large "Bethlehem Farm," will ere long be obliterated. 

t Mr. Worbas was a native of Jutland, and a carpenter by trade. He 
had immigrated to the Province in 1753, and was residing at the Gna- 
denhutten Mission (Lehighton in Carbon county) at the time of the 



THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHEM. VA 

ments in the building-, and in Jnne following application 
was made to the Court at Easton in their behalf, for a 
permit to entertain travelers and to sell beer and cider. 
That body was also petitioned by the steward of the set- 
tlement to grant "a change in the old Gnadenlmtten road 
from the point of its intersection with the ]Manockasy as 
far as the intended House of Entertainment on the hill, 
so as to ha\ e it pass over a piece of lowland, thence by 
the brick-kiln, thence the best way to said intended Inn, 
and thence along the road going to Easton to where said 
road forks, — from there to proceed to the Lecha, to cross 
it above the Island, and after crossing, to strike the road 
to Philadelphia near where Mr. Isaac Ysselstein formerly 
lived." A King's Road, leading from the Inn to the 
Bethlehem Eerry, having been granted about the same 
time, the house of which we write was now firmly seated 
on the then great thoroughfares of travel. Hence we 
need not be surprised to learn that on the twenty-fourth 
day of September of the aforementioned year 1760, (this 
day marks an epoch,) the first travelers were entertained 
under its hospitable roof. But yet how modest were its 
equipments when thus setting out in its long career of 
public service, may be inferred from the statement, that 
these had been provided in full at an outlay of £39. 17s 

massacre in November of 1755, being one of the five who were fortu- 
nate enough to escape from the hands of the merciless savages. On 
retiring from the Inn, he took cliarge of the grist mill at Bethlehem. 
In the si)ring of 1769 he removed with his family to Knowlton town- 
ship, then in Morris county, West Jersey, where, on a branch of the 
Bequest, called Beaver Dam, tlie Moravians were beginning a settle- 
ment, first called Greenland and subsequently Hope. Here Mr. Wor- 
bas was miller. In 1771 he removed to Nazareth, and occupied the 
first house erected in the new town of that name. He died there in 
1806, in the eighty-fourth year of his age. 



14 THE .srX INX AT BETIILKIIEM. 

2d. Ill fact, the house was neither completed in its de- 
tails, nor fully furnished until in the early spring of 17(31, 
—whereupon, application was made by Matthew Schropp, 
steward of the Bethlehem Economy, to the Court of 
Quarter Sessions, held at Easton on the 17th day of 
June, in the tliirty-third year of the reign of George the 
Tiiird, for a license, in which application Peter Worbas 
was recommended to his Honor tlie Governor as a fit 
p3rson to keep a public house of entertainment. The 
request was favorably entertained, and the license granted. 
The cost of this instrument was £2. 18s. 6d. 

In August of this yeSr the new Inn w^as for the first 
time honored by the presence of the highest official in 
the Province, as during the sessions of a conference with 
the Six Nation and Susquelianna Indians, held at Eas- 
ton, Governor Hamilton and some of the members of his 
Council rode over to Bethlehem. The conference, we 
would infer, was a dis*^asteful one to the Governor ; for on 
learning while yet in town of the arrival of the Indians, 
*'he told the Council that he had not invited them, that 
he had no business with them that he knew of except to 
receive prisoners, and that they must have been invited 
by some officious people of this city."* Hence it was, 
perhaps, that he rode over to Bethlehem on the ninth of 
August, to obliterate all remembrance of liis late chagrin 
in a good dinner at The Sun Inn. He was followed on 
the thirteenth, by a large company of Indians, (the Con- 
ference had closed,) some of whom came to visit old 
acquaintances, others to have their pieces mended by the 
gunsmith. These, however, encamped daring their so- 

* Colonial Records 8, p. 630. 



THE SUN INN AT r.i:TIILi:HEM. lo 

journ, in the adjacent fields, yet under the very shadow 
of tlie Inn. 

The year 17-62 is memorable in the history of the Mo- 
ravians in Pennsylvania as marking an important cliange 
in their social polity. It was then that the Bethlehem 
Economy was by common consent finally dissolved. 
Whe.i-eas during its existence all the members of the So- 
ciety had contributed their labor toward the Common- 
wealth, certain branches of industry only were hereaftei- 
conducted for the sui)port of its enteiprises, by specially 
appointed agents who were amenable to the chief propri- 
etor of the Moravian estates. Among these were a num- 
ber of trades, four farms, and the Inn of which we write. 
For the latter a new era now opened. It was no longer 
known simply as "the House of Entertainment," but was 
called by the name it bears to the present day ; where- 
upon in June of 1764, there appeared upon its sign-board, 
by way of emblem, a sun in meridian splendor.* But 
before this, on the first of August, 1762, Jasper Pay net 

* " 17tli May, 1764. The Sun Inn Dr. to Cash, paid for 
making a sign post - ■ £-1 2. 

22. June, 17(54. Do. Do. to Do., paid for painting 
the sign -------- - —10.—" 

Ledger of the Sun Inn., 

t Mr. Papie Avas born at Twickenham, ("whose Eel-Pie House was 
for two centuries and as late as 1830 a favorite resort for refreshment 
and recreation to water parties,") in the county of Middlesex, England. 
He was a wine cooper by trade. Immigrating with his wife to Penn- 
sylvania in 1743, he settled at Bethlehem and was appointed steward 
and accountant to the Economy. At the time of the Indian incursions 
in upper Northampton, (in November of 1755,) he was residing at the 
mission house in Smithfield township, (it stood on the west side of 
Brodhead's creek and opposite Dansbury, the residence of Daniel Brod" 
head,) whence he escaped, a few days before it was burned by the 
savages. When appointed to the jsosition at the Inn, he Avas a wid- 
ower, but in .Julv of 17G3 he married a Miss Way of New London. 



10 THE SI^N INN AT BETIILKIIEM. 

assumed the superintendenc^e of its aft'airs, at a salary of 
£30 per annum and his h'ving. He was assisted in the 
management during the four years of liis incMiuibency 
successively by Peter Worhas, Daniel KuncLler, John 
Kubel, Peter Goetje, and Just Jansen. 

An inventory of stock taken on the 4th of May of the 
last mentioned year, showed tliat £437. 2s. 9d. liad thus 
far been expended in equipping the house, — said inven- 
tory embracing furniture to the amount of £157. Is. 3d., 
kitchen utensils, and the contents of the larder and 
the cellar. Three Englisli and three German double 
bed-steads, six single bed-steads, six double blankets, 
twenty-two single striped blankets and woolen rugs, 
valued together at £52. 4s. 6d., in part furnished the 
travelers' chambers. Besides two gross of tobacco pipes, 
there were stowed in tlie cellar, at the above date, 20 
gallons of Madeira, 10 gallons of Teneritle, 2 quarter 
casks of white Lisbon, 109 gallons of Philadelphia rum, 
64 gallons of West India rum, 8 gallons of shrub, 40 gal- 
lons of cider-royal, 4 hogsheads of cider, and one barrel 
of beer. The beer both small and strong that was drawn 
at the Sun for almost twenty years was brewed at Chris- 
tian's Spring on the Barony. Thirty-eight barrels were 
consumed in 1762. Thomas Cadwallader and Joseph 
Sims, Mifflin and Massey, William Hazlitt, Henry Kep- 
pele, Jacob Viney, Nicholas Garrison, Jr., and subse- 
quent to 1766 George Schlosser, wine merchants and 
grocers in Philadelphia, furnished the liquors for the Sun 
to the close of the last century. The amount of excise 
paid to the collector (Jesse Jones, a son of John Jones of 
Bethlehem township, filled the office for many years) in 



THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHEM. 17 

1762 was £13. 12. Id. The net profits of tlie house for 
the year ending May 4th, 1763, amounted to £26. 9s. 
How studiously the good reputation of both the house 
and its cuisine were guarded, while yet in their infancy, 
may be inferred in part from the following eniimei-ation 
of novelties and conveniences added to their equipments 
by Mr. Payne — to wit : "five pair of brass fire-dogs. Delft 
hand-basins, silver spoons, China bowls and cups and 
saucers, brass candle-sticks, brass shovels and tongs, steel 
snuffers, table mats, servers with cruets, ^ large oval fish- 
dish, plate racks, chafing dishes, a bottle crane, a fish 
'kettle, and a spit with handirons and jack for roasting 
meat." The rates for travelers were as follows: for a 
•dinner one shilling, for a supper six pence, for a breakfast 
six pence, for mght's lodging six pence, and for shaving, 
if desired, six pence. They we're confessedly low, but so 
was the market, — beef selling at three pence ha'penny per 
pound, mutton and veal each at three pence, pork per 
hundred at two pence ha'penny per pound, flour at two 
pence, butter at six pence, cream at two shillings and milk 
at eight pence per gallon.* Despite all this, however, 
■Governor Hamilton saw fit to dine tw^ice at The Sun in 
June of 1762, both when on his way from Philadelphia 
to Easton, (where he had made an appointment to meet 



* The latter necessaries were furnished by the " Bethlehem Farm.*' 
Mr. Frederic Beckel, its farmer, renders tlie following account under 
■date of 14th May, 1767, to wit: 

"The Sun Inn to Bethlehem Farm, Dr., f<»r 116j galtena 
good milk, from 8th July, 1767, to date, being 44 weeks 
and 3 days, lOJ quarts being delivered per week, at 8d. 
per gallon. £ s d 

3. 17. 8." 
Ledger of the Sun Inn. 



IS THE SITN INN AT BF/ITILEHEM, 

some Indians,) and on his return — which fact seems to 
demonstrate that the road from th« capital of the Pro- 
vince to the Seat of Justice of Northampto-n, then lay 
throufijh tlie villag-e of Bethlehem. Sir William Johnson, 
Baronet, followed the Governor, on the 29th of the afore- 
mentioned month. 

The prospect for peace which had dawned so briglrtly^ 
after four years of uncertainty and of tedious negotiation 
with the alienated Indians of the Province and their 
Western allies, was suddenly darkenred, when in the sum- 
mer of 1763 "the last act rn the drama of the French' 
and Indian war" was inaugurated by the Ottowa Pontiac. 
Upper Northampton for a second time became the scene- 
of savage incursions, and Bethlehem resounded with the 
tramp of soldiery and the martial music of drum and fife- 
as in the gloomy month of November of 1755. On the 
30th of July, 1763, one of two companies that had been 
enlisted in the count}', after having been reviewed by 
Colonel Horsfield, set out from their rendezvous at The 
Sun, for the defense of the frontiei-s. The enemy had 
struck in Smithfield, and next in Whitehall, and when in 
the first week of October they attacked Captain Wether- 
hold's command at John Stenton's, murdered Jean Hor- 
ner and Andrew Haslet's wife and children, and fired the 
dwellings of his neighbors James Allen and Philip Kratzer 
in the settlement, two hundred fugitives from Allen and 
Lehigh sought an asylum and were sheltered in the Inns 
at Bethlehem. The ensuing months were months of 
harassing anxiety for the inhabitants of that place. Them- 
selves and their Indian converts (there were seventy -seven 
of these at Nain in the vicinity, and forty-four at Wech- 



THE Sim INN AT BETHLEHEM. VJ 

'qnctank in Cliestnut Hill township) were charged with 
•being in league with the enenij, — and threatened with 
violence. Hereupon the Moravian Indians threw them- 
selves upon the protection of Government and were 
removed to Philadelphia. Watches were meanwhile «et 
aiightlj in Bethlehem, and |X)rtions of the town, including 
the Inn and farm-yard were palisaded;* and when in the 
night of tlie 18th of November the torch was applied to 
the oil mill, it was evident that anotlier beside a savage 
foe was eager for the destruction af the Moravian settle- 
ment. But this time of danger passed bj, and it was not 
long betbre the popular mind grew calm, and reversed a 
judgment which it had rashly passed in a, frenzy of exas- 
jieration. 

It must next be stated that in September of this 
memorable year, George Klein, of Bethlehem, provided 
the first means of public conveyance, between that place 
a,nd the capital af the Province, his coach or "stage- 
wagon" setting out from The Sun on every Monday 
morning for Philadelphia— and from the "King of Prus- 
sia" on Race street in the capital on every Thursday 
morning for Bethlehem, This humble enterprise fore- 
shadowed the numerous stage-lines which in subsequent 
years did business or had their offices in the house of 
M'hich we write. 

On the second of April, 1765, the Justices of the county 
and other officers in the Province service, who had been 
appointed a commission by the Governor, were convoked 



* At the same time the windows of the house were secured by shub- 
<ers, which aj-c wanting in the original design. 



20 THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHESf. 

at Tlie Sim by James Allen,* to deliberate on the best 
means of removing the Moravian Indians who- had lately" 
Tetiu-ned from Pliiladelpliia, to tlie Siisqiiehamia. 

Governor John Penn, and his brother Richard,! spent 
a day at the Inn in Julj following. 

Before closing this review of Mr. Payne's administra- 
tion, it must be added that in Api'il of 176G, water was 
introduced into the house, wooden pipes having been laid 
from the elevated reservoir that stood at the foot of Main 
street, along the east line of said street, through tlie farm- 
yard, and thence into the Inn., illthough a well had 
been dug on the premises in the fall of 1762, an additional 
supply of water was carried to the house weekly, until 
its more convenient introduction, as had just been, stated^ 

Jasper Payne retired from the Inn on the ninth of 
December, 1766, and was succeeded by its second land- 
lord. 

John Andrew Albrecht,J (Albright.) Excepting Gover- 
nor John Penn's sojourn at The Sun in April of 1768,. 

* James Allen, the foundei- of AUeiitovvn, was a son of Chief Justice 
William Allen, of Phihidelphia. He died in that city in 1777. 

f Sons of Richard Penn by Hannah Lardner, and grand,sons of the 
Founder. John, the elder of the two, was Governor of the Province 
between November of 1763 and April of 1771, (in that interval he mar- 
ried Anne, a daughter af William Allen,) — and again between August 
of 1773 and December of 1775. He built Lansdowne on the Schuylkill,, 
died in Bucks county in 1795, — but his remains were taken to England. 
Richard, the younger brother, was Governor between October of 1771 
and Augast of 1773. Watson de.scribes him as having been a "fine 
l>ortly looking man, a bon vivant, and very poimlar." He married 
Polly Masters, visited Pennsylvania in 1808, and died in England in 
1811. 

X Mr. Albrecht, who was a native of Fuhle in Tliuringia, immigrated 
in the summer of 1750. In 1766 he married Elizabeth, a daughter of 
Balzar Orth of Lebanon township, Lancaster county. 



THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHEM. 21 

and again in April of 17G1), and an entry in the records 
of tliose days to tlie effect that in the month of October 
of the hist mentioned year "t!ie house was unusually 
crowded with travelers and boarders," there- is nothing of 
note come down to us having a bearing on its history 
durinc; this administration. Diirino- the Governor's three 
day's stay at The Sim in 1768, (April 27th, 28th and 
29th,) when on his way to visit the Aliens at Trout Hall,* 
— he and his wife, we read, spent a pleasant afternoon on 
the river, witnessing the men of the village taking shad 
with the bush-net after the Indian mode of fishing. The 
profits of the house for the jenr ending Hay 31st, 1771, 
amounted to £76. Is. 7d. 

In consequence of a division of the estates and posses- 
sions of the Moravian Church that was made about this 
time, both in this country and abroad, the Sun Inn, (to- 
gether with other messuages as well as farms and wood- 
lands,) passed into the hands of the Stewards of the So- 
ciety at Bethlehem. Hencjforth for almost seventy -five 
years it was conducted solely for the benefit of that body, 
at first by salaried agents, (as late as 1830,) and subse- 
quently hj tenants, in consideration of an annual rent. 
The transfer was made on the first of June, 1771, the Inn 
and stabling adjoining being appraised at £1,100, and the 
stock at £418 Penna. currency. With this new order of 



* Built by William Allen prior to 1755, and marked "William Al- 
len's House," on a "draft of a road leading from Easton to Reading, 
being in length fifty miles, but to count from the center of both the 
Baid towns, fifty miles and one half mile," drawn by David Schultze in 
October of 1755. Trout Hall stood on high ground, about an eighth of 
a mile above the confluence of the Jordan Creek and the Little Lehigh, 
and what remains of this seat of olden mirth and hospitality is incor- 
porated with the buildings of Muhlenberg College. 



22 THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHEM. 

things, there was also a cliange of incumbents, and ou 
the second of June, 1771, accordingly, 

Just Jansen* and Mary, his wife, occupied the Inn, 
which it fell to their lot to superintend during the most 
eventful years of its existence. 

In the first week of September of 1772, we find General 
Gagef and his family among the number of its guests, 
and in May of 1773, Governor Eichard Penn.J The 
latter spent eight days at the house. Governor John 
Penn partook of its hospitality in May of 1774, and for 
the last time in May of 1776. The Proprietary Govern- 
ment under the auspices of the British Crown, was, how- 
ever, already then in its decadence, and in the summer 
of the ensuing year, this the last of the Penns in office in 

* Mr. Jansen, the fifth son of .Jens and Else Gravenson, was born at 
Wunst in North Jutland, in June of 1719, and was brought up to the 
pea. Having become attached to the Moravians, he served for a time 
on their ship, the Irene, which in the interval between 1748 and 1757 
plied between New York and London or Amsterdam, constituting an 
important means of intercourse between the mother Church and her 
dependencies in the new world. In an enumeration of the inhabitants 
of Bethlehem made in 1756, we find Mr. Jansen registered briefly, 
"Just Jansen, mariner, sojourning here." Subsequent to that year, 
he assisted at "The Crown," and occasionally at the Ferry, and finally, 
as has been stated, entered Mr. Payne's employ at The Sun. In No- 
vember of 176G he married Mary Fisher. On closing his career as 
landlord, he opened a small variety store (it stood on the west side of 
Main street, opposite the post-ofiice), and was in business at the time of 
his decease in June of 1790. 

t General Gage had succeeded General Amherst in the chief com- 
mand of the British forces in America. In 1774 he was appointed 
Governor of Massachusetts, in September of that year he began to for- 
tify Boston, and subsequently planned the expedition to Concord, 
which resulted in the aflair at Lexington on the memorable 19th April, 
1775. 

X Richard Penn was Acting Governor between October of 1771 and 
August of 1773, during his brother's absence in England, whither the 
latter had sailed on receiving intelligence of their father's decease. 



THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHEM. 23 

the Province of Pennsylvania was, on recommendation of 
the Continental Congress, made a prisoner, and confined 
on parole within a circuit of six miles from his seat at 
Lansdowne. 

The history of the Sun Inn at the period that has been 
reached in our narrative is intimately blended with that 
of Bethlehem during the exciting times of the American 
Revolution. For six years that place was a thoroughfare 
for troops, — twice in that interval it was the seat of the 
Continental Hospital besides being occupied for three 
months bj' the heavy baggage and munitions of war of 
the army of the North, atid temporarily, too, the refuge 
of the American Congress. Hence it came to pass that 
the house of which we write was honored by the presence 
of men whose names are identified with the great move- 
ment that resuUed in the separation of her transatlantic 
Colonies from England, and the establishment of a Re- 
public in the new world. It is doubtful whether another 
house of entertainment in the country can lay claim to 
having slieltered under its roof so many of the leading 
patriots, statesmen and military chieftains of the war of 
American Independence, as fhe time-honored Sun Inn at 
Bethlehem. 

A few days after Washington had taken the command 
of the Continental army, with his headquarters at Cam- 
bridge, (July .3d, 1775,) detachments of militia from 
Maryland and Virginia, which designed to participate in 
the siege of Boston, began to move through Bethlehem. 
Among them was a company of mounted rifles, Virginians, 
under Captain Morgan (subsequently a Brigadier General 
and the hero of the Cowpens), who, we read, made a two 



24 THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHEM. 

days' halt in the town (July 24 and 25). This movement 
of troops, northward, ceased however, about the middle 
of August. 

Passing over tlie transit of the prisoners that had been 
made by General Montgomery on the capture of St. Jolm 
and Chambly, (these were being moved southward to 
some secure point inland,) and the incessant marching of 
recruits from the lower counties on their way to "the 
Flying Camp" at Amboy, during the spring and summer 
of 1776, — we come to that memorable time in the Revo- 
lutionary history of Bethlehem, in which it was the seat 
of the General Hospital of the hard-pressed patriot 
army. 

After the repulse of the Americans at Brooklyn Heights 
(August 27), Washington withdrew his troops to New 
York, which city, however, a few days subsequently fell 
into the hands of the enemy. This loss was followed by 
that of Fort Washington and Fort Lee in quick succes- 
sion. Having crossed the North River into New Jersey, 
the General-in-Chief continued his retreat to Newark, 
New Brunswick, Princeton and Trenton, closely pursued 
by Cornwallis. It was at this crisis in the affairs of the 
army, that the removal of its Hospital (in which two 
thousand sick and wounded were lying) from Morristown 
to some point in the interior became an imperative neces- 
sity; and, on the third of December, an express rider 
brought the following order, addressed to tlie Rev. John 
Ettwein at Bethlehem : 

"According to his Excellency General Washington's 
order, the General Hospital of the army is removed to 
Bethlehem ; and you will do the greatest act of liumanity 



TnE SUN IXX AT BETHLEHEM. % 

by immedialjelj providing {)roper l)nildJngs for its rocep- 
tioH. 

"John WARirEN,* 
"Gen'I Surgeon to the Continental Army." 

Doetoi'6 Warren, Shippen and ]\Iorgant arrived on the 
evening of the aforementioned third of Decetriber, and 
took possession of a part of the large bnildi'Hg at the foot 
•of Main street (now the center of the Yo-ung Ladies' 
Seminary) for the use of tlie Hospital. Two hundred 
and fifty J sick and wounded occupied -it next day, and it 
was the 27th of March, 1777, before the house was entirely 
evacuated. In that interval one hundred and ten of its 
inmates died. Their -remains were interred on the hill- 
side 0*1 the right bank of the Manockasy. 

But meanwhile ether distinguished mea had been led 
by the fotrtmaes of war to the once ^uiet town of Bethle- 
3iem. General Gates at the head -of a detachment of his 
■command arrived on the 17th of December, and was fol- 
.lowed next day by General Sullivan with Lee's division 
of four tliGusand men, the latter cliieftain having been 
^captured a few days jn-evious by some British cavalry at 
Whitens Tav-ern, near Basking Ridge, in New Jersey. 

* A brotJier of the patriot Joseph WaiTen. Participated in the battle 
-of Lexington,— in June ef 1773 was made Senior Surgeon to the Hospi- 
ital, and after having accompanied tlie army through two yeai's of peril 
and hardship, he was appointed to the charge of tlie militaiy hosjiitals 
in Boston. 

t Dr, John Morgan, of Philadelphia, who with Dr. Williarn Shippen 
laid tlie permanent foundation of tlie medical institutions of our coun- 
try. On liis return from Europe in 1765, the former was appointed 
Professor of the Institutes ef Medicine, and the latter Professor of Anat- 
■omy in the Medical College at Philadelphia. 

:J: Provision had been made for the reception of others at Easton, Al- 
ien town, and in their vicinity. 

4 



28? THE Sim INxV AT BETHLEHEST. 

Scarcely a week in the fii'st eight moiitlis of 17Z7, but 
was marked by the movement of troops through Bethle- 
liem, aiid the addit-ion of some now historical name to tlie 
poll of those who sajo«rned at the old Swn Inn. Jolm. 
Adanas and Lyman Hall (a signer of the Declaration' of 
Independence from Georgia) spent the night of the 25th 
of Janwary nader its roof. General Armstrong was a 
guest on the 11th of March. Brigadier Generali Fermoy 
and General Gates- followed m April, — General Schuyler 
and staff in May, (he was en roi>te for Albany,) and in 
June, William Ellery and William Whipple, delegates to 
the Continental Congress, respectively from Rhode Island' 
and New Hampsliire. General Mifflin v/as at Betbleliem 
on the 25th of July, and General Schuyler a second time 
on the 14tb of Attgnst. His family lodged for upwards 
of two weeks at The Sun. Finally Generals- Green and 
Knox arrived from headquarters on the twenty-third of 
the last-mentioned month. 

With the begi^nning of September, 1777, opened the 
nwst eventful period in the ReYolutionary history of Beth- 
lehem. For scarcely had the excitement occasioned by the 
arrival from Reading of upwards of two bundred prisoners 
of war (one hundred of these were partisans of Donald 
]\IcDonald from the Cross Creek settlement near Fayette- 
ville, N. C.) fully subsided, when intelligence came of 
reverses to the army, succeeded by a rumor that Bethle- 
hem had been selected as headquarters. On the lltlr 
of September, as is known, was fought the battle of the 
Brandywine or Chad's Ford, at which point Washington 
had made an unsuccessful stand for the defense of Phila- 
delphia. Following this disaster, and Howe's movement 



THE SUN INN AT BETm.EHEM. -2? 

^npon the then federal city, the military stores of the arniy 
of the North were Imrrietl inland from Frencli Creek, and 
by the twenty-third of the aforementioned month upwards 
'of nine hundred ai-my wagons were in camp in the fields 
in the rear or north of -the Snn Inn -at Bethlehem. Meaw- 
while Barron de -Kalb and a corps of French engineers had 
arrived, their errand being to select an advantageous posi- 
tion for the army in the vicinity of the town, should Howe 
follow «p his successes, and compel its shattered regiments 
•once more to make & stand. A change in that General's 
programme, however, drew the main army elsewliere, and 
-thus Bethlehem failed to witness what might have proved 
a decisive engagement in a most critical period of the 
American Revolution. 

On the 19th of September, Dr. Jack&ou, of th-e Hospital, 
hrouMit the foUowiuo- order, addressed to tlie Bev. Mr^ 
Ettwein of Bethlehem : 

' ' SiK : It gives me great pain to be obliged by order of 
•Congress to send my sick and wounded soldiers to your 
peaceable village ; but so it is. We will want room for 
two thousand at Bethlehem, Easton and Northampton, 
and you may expect them on Saturday or Sunda}''. These 
are dreadful times. I am truly concerned for your So- 
■ciety, and wish sincerely this stroke could be averted ; 
but it is impossible. "William Shippen." 

"On Saturday, the twentieth of September," (1777) 
writes a chronicler of those stirring times, " we began to 
realize the extent of the panic that had stricken the in- 
habitants of the capital, as crowds of civilians as well as 
men in military life began to enter our town in the char- 
acter of fugitives. Next day their numbers increased, 



28 THE SLTf INX AT BETHLEHEM. 

and towards evening the first of the sick and wonndedi 
arrived. Among the latter was General LaFayette,* 
attended by his suite and General Woodford and Colonel 
Armstrong. The Continental Congress, too, was largely 
represented, numbering some of its m€>st inflnentiali 
mernbers, such as John Hiincock, Samuel Adams, Henry 
Laurens- and Charles Thomsom The Inn was crowded, 
to its utmost capacity, and for want of room, many were 
billeted at private houses and in the farm, buildings." 

The center of the present Young Ladies^ Seminary was 
again vaeated for the use of the Hospital, and was occu- 
pied 3>& such in th<3 interval between the 20th of Septem- 
ber, 1777, and the 15tb of April, 1778. t 

There iti an interestin-g letter extant, intliehaBdwritintr 

o ' to- 

of Rieha^rd Henry Lee, of Virginia, w-ritten, we read, at 
the SiHi Inn, on. the 22d of September, 1777, whi«h lias 
a direct bearing o» tbis iMstoi-j'. Its occasion was as fol- 
lows ', While Rev. Mr. Ettwein was conducting the lately 
arrived delegates to Congress through the Widows' and 
Sisters' Houses (^tbe stone buildings on Church street), be- 
took occasion to plead for their inmates, whose removal 
from their homes had been urged by the surgeons iiD 
order to meet the growing waiits of the Hospital. His 
representations availing, Henry Laurens, on returning to. 
Ihe Inn, authorized Lee to indite the following order : 

* LaFayette -while at Bethlehem, (he set (xit for White Marsh on the 
18th of October,) lodged in the house o.f Mr. Frederic Beckel, which at 
that time was the first dwelling south of the Sun Inn. It was only re- 
cently removed by Mr. Ambrose Raueh, 

t It is recorded that seven hundred were in hospital in the Single 
Brethren's Plouse on the 31st of December, 1777, and that three hun- 
dred deceased during tlie winter. There are therefore upwards of four 
hundred Kevolutionary soldiers buried witliin the limits of modern 
Bethlehem, 



THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHEM. 29 

"Bethlehem, 22d Sept., 1777. 
"Having here observed a diligent attention to the sick 
and wounded, and a benevolent desire to make the neces- 
sary provision for the relief of the distressed as far as the 
power of the Brethren enables tliem, 

"We desire that all Continental officers may refrain 
from disturbing the persons or property of the Moravians 
in Bethlehem ; and, particularly, that they do not disturb 
or molest the houses where the women are assembled. 

"Given under our hands at the time and place above 
mentioned. 

"John Hancock, "Richard Henry Lee, 

"Samuel Adams, "Henry Laurens, 

"James Duane, "William Duer, 

"Nathan Brownson, "Cornelius Harnett, 
"jSIathaniel Folsom, "Benjamin Harrison, 
"Richard Law, "Joseph Jones, 

"Elyphalet Dyer, "John Adams, 

"Henry Marchant, "William Williams, 

^'Delegates to Congress.'''' 
The following extracts from the Diary of John Adams 
(see voL 2 of his works) are here in place : 

'•'-Sept. 22, 1777. Monday. Dined at Shannon's in 
Easton at the Forks. Slept at Jansen's in Bethlehem. 

''iSejjt. 23. Mr. Okely, Mr. Hasse and Rev. Mr. Ett- 
wein came to see me. J\Ir. Ettwein showed us the Chil- 
dren's Meeling at half after eight o'clock, consisting of an 
organ and singing in the German language. Mr. Ettwein 
gave a discourse in German, and next in English. Miss 
Langley showed us the society of single women, and ]\Ir. 
Ettwein the waterworks and the manuftxctories. There 



30 THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHEM. 

are six sets of works in one building,- — a hemp-mill, an 
oil-mill, a mill to grind bark for the tanner, — and a fuller's 
mill both of cloth and leather. Thej raise a good deal 
of madder. We walked among the rows of cherry trees, 
with spacious orchards of apple trees on each side of the 
cherry walk. The Society of Single Women have turned 
oat for the sick. 

" Sept. 25. Rode from Bethlehem through Allentown 
to a German tavern, about eighteen miles from Reading." 

It remains to be stated before closing this review of 
the year 1777 at Bethlehem, that John Hancock passed 
the night of the second and third of November at the Sun 
Inn, (he had come from Yorktown, where Congress was 
in session,) whence he set out the following morning 
under an escort of cavalry which had been awaiting his 
arrival, for Boston. 

Alluding merely to other visitors of note who graced 
the old Inn with their presence during the first six months 
of 1778, (many of these were on the way to or from 
Yorktown where Congress sat until the beginning of July,) 
— such as General Green, General Gates and family, 
Ethan Allen, Baron Steuben, Pulaski, General Conway, 
Generals Mcintosh and Lewis and Gouverneur Morris, — 
we have next to record the advent of a then very impor- 
tant personage in the eyes of the American people. This 
was M. Gerard, who came to Bethlehem on the 25th of 
November of the last mentioned year, Rev. Mr. Ettwein 
having been advised of his coming by the President of 
Congress, in the following lines : 

"My Deak Friend: 

"M. Gerard, the Minister Plenipotentiary of France, 



THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHEM. 31 

will be, provided he meets no obstruction on the road, at 
your place on Wednesday, the 25th inst., about midday. 
This worthy character merits regard from all the citizeijs 
of these States. An acquaintance with him will afford 
you satisfaction, and I am persuaded his visit will work 
no inconvenience to your community. Don Juan de 
Miralles, a Spanish gentleman highly recommended by 
the Governor of Havana, will accompany M. Gerard. The 
whole suite may amount to six gentlemen and perhaps a 
servant to each. I give this previous intimation in order 
that preparation suitable to the occasion may be made by 
Mr. Jansen at the tavern, and otherwise as you think 
expedient. 

"Believe me, dear sir, to be with sincere respect and 
very great affection your friend and most humble servant, 

"Henry Laukens. 

"PMa., 23d Nov., 1778. 

"The B.EV. Mfi. Ettwein, Bethlehem. 

Lieutenant Anbury, a British ofHcer, who was at Beth- 
lehem in the autumn of this year, has the following flat- 
tering notice of The Sun :* "The tavern at this place is 
on a good plan, and well calculated for the convenience 
and accommodation of travelers. The building, which is 
very extensive, is divided throughout by a passage near 
thirty (?) feet wide. On each side are convenient apart- 
ments, consisting of a sitting-room, which leads into two 
separate bed chambers. All these are well lighted and 
have fire-places in them. On your arrival you are con- 
ducted to one of these apartments, and delivered the key, 
so that you are as free from intrusion as if in your own 
*See his "Travels in Aiuericii," London, 1789. 



32 THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHEM. 

house. Every other acconimoclation was equal to the 
Ih-st tavern in London. 

"You may be sure our surprise was not little, after 
liaving been accustomed to such miserable fare at other 
ordinaries, to see a larder displayed with plenty of fish, 
fowl and game. Another matter of surprise, as we have 
not met with the like in all our travels, was excellent 
wines of all sorts, which to us was a most delicious treat, 
— not having tasted any since we left Boston ; for, not- 
withstanding the splendor and elegance of several families 
we visited in Virginia, wine was a stranger to their tables. 
For every apartment a servant is appointed to attend, 
whose whole duty it is to wait on the company belonging 
to it, and who is as much your servant during your stay 
as one of your own domestics. The accommodation for 
horses is equal. In short, in planning this tavern, they 
seem solely to have studied the ease, comfort and con- 
venience of travelers ; and it is built upon such an exten- 
sive scale, that it can readily accommodate one hundred 
and sixty persons." 

Burgoyne had surrendered his army of six thousand 
men to General Gates at Saratoga, on the 17th of Octo- 
ber, 1 777. Among the prisoners made on that memorable 
occasion there were upw^ards of two thousand Brunswick- 
ers, under the command of Baron Riedesel, who with 
other officers, both German and British, passed through 
Bethlehem on the 5th of January, 1779, en route for 
Virginia, to which State Congress had ordered them on 
parole. The Baron was accompanied by his wife and 
three children, his Chaplain the Rev. John Augustus 
Mihus, and Major General Pliihps of Burgoyne's army. 



'THE SU5 IXN AT BETirLEIlE^l. ^S 

■-^M the 26tli of September, this distinguislied coniimny 
was agam at Bethlehem, md after a short sojourn at 
lElizabethtown, we find its -members inmates of The Sun, 
a second time, and for upwards of a month, in the int^erval 
betweeii the 10th of October fmd the 25 d of November. 
They had seletJted BethMaem for a ten^porary home, (in 
preference to Nazaretii,)—A^'ti8hiiigton having given tliem 
this limited choice. Lieutenant Anbury states in his 
Travels that "General Philips had been so delighted with 
the Inn during his first sojourn (in Janutiry) that after lie 
diad quitted Virginia, not being permitted to go to New 
York on account of some mflitary operations l^elng on 
foot in the Jerseys, he returned back some forty miles 
merely on account -of its accommodations." 

Tlve follo^'ing extract from a translation of "Letters 
and Journals relating to the War of the American Eevo- 
Hution, by Mrs. General Riedesel," (New York, 1827,) 
•throws more light upon this sojourn of these liistorical 
rguests of the Sun Inn: 

"We now returned to Bethlehem, -where my Inisband 
and General Philips were allowed by the Americans to 
-.remain until the particulars of tlie -exchange, wliich was 
yet unfinished, should be settled ; and, as ^ur former 
(landlord in this place liad treated us with kind hospitality, 
we, all of us, determined to boaa-d with him— all of us, 
ibeing sixteen persons and four house-servants. We had 
.also about twenty horses. 0«r host would make us no 
definite agreement about the price, and as none of us had 
•any money, this was very convenient, as he would cheer- 
fully wait for his pay till we received some. We supposed 
Slim to be an honest and reasonable man, and the more so 
5 



S¥ THE ST'N INX AT BETTILP:HE3r. 

as he belonged to tlie coiniiiiinity of the Moravian Breth- 
ren, and the Inn was the one owned bj- that Society.. 
But haw great was our snrpri&e, when atl&r a lesidence 
of six weeks, and just as we liad received permission to- 
go to New York, we were ser\-ed with a bilF of thirty-two- 
thousand dohars, that is to say in American paper money, 
which is about four hundi-ed guineas. Had it not been 
for a royalist who Just at this time chanced to pass through^ 
the village seeking to purchase hard money at any price,, 
we should have- been placed in the greatest embarrassment, 
and would not have been able by any possibihty to leave 
the town. From-* him we were so fortunate as to receive 
for one piaster, eighty dollai-s in paper money, 

"My husband suffered- greatly the whole time from, 
constant pains in the head, and at night he could scarcely 
breathe. To obtain a little relief, he now accustomed 
himself to the use of snuff, a practice,^ which until this 
period he had regarded v/ith the greatest aversion. I first 
persuaded him to take one pinch. He believed that I 
was making^ fun of him ; but as the very next instant 
after trial he experienced relief, he exclianged his pipe- 
fbr a snuff-box. ]My little Caroline was very sick with a 
choking cough, and as my health was dehc^ate, we all 
heartily wished to reach New York as soon as possible." 

Meanwhile, however, a far more distinguished though 
an untitled personage had added her name to the record 
of sojourners^ at the Bethlehem Inn. This was Lady 
Washington, who arrived from, Ejistoii eai'Iy in the morn- 
ing of the 15th of June, She was accompanied by 
Generals Sullivan* and Maxwell and other officers, be- 

* Sullivan had his headquarters at Easton, -where he was fittiug out 
an expedition against the Indians on the Susquehiinna. 



THE S\'K rXX AT J'.lOtllLKllKM. 3-5 

• sides her proper ef.cort. The fonner returned to cam}-, 
■before noon. After dinner, tke distinguished ^uest ^va^ 
•waited upon hj the clergymen, and sliown the olajects of 
iinterestin tlie town. She also attended worship in the 
•evening, and early in the morning of the 16th set out for 
^'^irginia. 

We have yet to mention the names of Josepli Reed, 
President of the Suf)reme Executive Coimcil ©f Pennsyl- 
vania, of John Bayard, Speaker of the General Assembly, 
and of David Rittenliouse, Treasurer of the State, as 
:guests at the Inn, during the last year of ^Ir, Jansen's 
4idministratioii of its affairs. 

The net profits of the house for the jear ending with 
the 31st of May, 1776, were £130. 8s. 2d.— for the next 
•year £124.— and for that ending with the 31st of May, 
1778, £150. 14s. Id., which annual 'income was never 
exceeded to tlie dose of tJie last century. Mr. Jansen 
retired from the -Inn in April of 1781, and was followed 

John Christian Ebert,* who conducted "its affairs for 
•upwards of nine years. 

The most memorable occurrence that fell in this ad- 
ministration, was General Washington's sojourn at Beth^ 
iehem, in July of 1782, while on his way to headcfuarters 
■at Newbureh. "In the forenoon of the 25th of July," 
writes a chronicler of those times, " we had the honor of 



*Mr. Ebert was born at Ottenhayn iu Upper Lusatia, in 1749. His 
■father being chief-huntsman of the Principality', the son was brought 
up to the same calling, and was ulso for a time forester on the estates. 
Having become attacliecl to the Moravians, he immigrated in 1770, an(l 
settled at Bethlehem. Here he married Ann Kosina .Jungmann, and 
thereupon took charge of the Inn. He died at that place in August oi 
1799. 



?^ THE sits: IXX AT BETHLEHEM". 

fvelcoming: his Excellency General Washington to oiie- 
town. He was accoBipanied by two-adjutants of his staff. 
Having been- conducted thi'ongk^ tlie large houses, andi 
l-ai-taken. of retVeshtnents in. the chapel of the Single 
Brethren's house, the ilhistrious visitor was escorted to* 
the mills and shops on Water street, and afforded an op- 
portunifej of inspecting; the w-ater-works. He and his aids- 
attended service ia the evening, and early in the morning 
of the 26thj set out from the Sun, via^Easton and Hope- 
for New burgh." 

In December of this year, the IMarquisde Chastelleux, 
a Magor General in the army of Rochambeau, sojourned 
a few days at Bethlehem. From a translation of his 
"Voyages dans l'Ameri(]ue Septentrionale,'** we extract 
the following, which has a bearing, on the history of the 
old Inn at that phice : " We had no difficulty iji finding, 
tlie tavern, for it is pi"eci,sely at the entrance of the town.. 
The Iwuse- was built at the expense of the Society of 
^loravian lirethren, to whom it formerly served as a 
magazine, and is very handsome and spacious. The per- 
son that keeps it is only the cashier, and is obliged to- 
Pender an account to the adminiatrators." In a foot-note 
to tliis passage, the translator adds : " This Inn, from its 
external appearajiee and its interior acconnriodations is. 
nut inferior to the best of the large inns in. England,, 
which, indeed, it very much resembles, in every respect.. 



* " Travels in North- America, in the years 1780j 1781 and 1782, bj 
tlie Marquis de Chastelleux, one of the forty members of the French 
Academy, and Major General in the French army, serving under the 
Count de Rochambeau." Translated from the French by an Englisli 
gentlemtm, who resided in America at tliat period, with notes by the 
translator. London, 1787. 



THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHEM. 37 

The first tiaie I was at Bethlehem, we lemaiiied there 
two or tliree days ; and were constantly supplied witli 
venison, moor-game, the most delicious red and yellow- 
bellied tront, the highest flavored wild strawberries, the 
most luxuriant asparagus, mid the best vegetables, in 
short, I ever saw; and notwithstanding the difficulty of 
procuring good wine and spirits at that period through- 
out the continent, we were here regaled with wine and 
brandy of the best quality, and exquisite old Port and 
Madeira." 

Dr. John Schepf, a German physician and an observant 
traveler who made the tour of the Middle and Southern 
States, East Florida and the Bahama Islands, in 1783 
and 1784, in his "Incidents of Travel" speaks of the Inn 
at Bethlehem, in the following words : " Its accommoda- 
tions equal those of the tirst hotels in America. The 
house is seldom without visitors, as besides occasional 
travelers, it is the favorite resort of Philadelphians, who 
are attracted by the good cheer its table is proverbial for 
offering." 

When in the autumn of 1785, a Boarding School for 
Young Ladies ^^the same which to the present day fully 
sustains its hereditary reputation) was established at Beth- 
lehem, its Inn acquired a new and desirable patronage, 
which proved a constant source of revenue, and on Com- 
mencement Day, year after year, crowded its precincts 
with a gay and happy throng. Mr. Ebert's reputation as 
a caterer, and a most obliging landlord, is a matter of 
tradition as well as of history, being spoken of by old 
inhabitants of Bethlehem to the present day. 



38 THE SUN INX AT BETHLEHEM. 

The fifth in the succession of landlords at The Sun, 
was 

Abraham Levering, who entered npon its nianage- 
iiieiit on the 1st of June, 1790. Mr. Levering was a son 
of John and Susan Levering, and was born at Nazareth 
in December of 1757. His wife, the popular hostess of 
the L;in for full nine years, was Christiana, a daughter of 
Lewis Gassier of Litiz. 

The events of interest which occurred during this ad- 
ministration, are briefly the following: 

In the first w^eek of March of 1792 a deputation of Six 
Nation Indians, fifty-one chiefs and warriors, including 
Eed Jacket, The Cornplanter, and Otsiquette, on the 
>vay to Philadelphia to meet Washington in conference, 
lodged at the Inn, with their teacher, the Rev. Samuel 
Kirkland. 

In 1795, on the completion of a public i-oad leading 
due south across the Lehigh IMountain, the stage which 
now arrived three times per week, from Philadelphia, 
relinquished the old route that led through Hellertown 
and past Stoffel Wagner's, the same that had been trav- 
eled since the establishment of George Klein's first line. 

The seventh of March, 1799, was peihaps tlie most 
memorable day at the Inn in Mr. Levering's incumbency, 
it being the day on which John Fries and his partisans res- 
cued some of their comrades from the hands of oflicers of 
the federal government. During the latter months of the 
year 1798, owing to several acts passed by Congress, (one 
ordering the registering of the number and the measure- 
ment of windows as the basis of a direct tax,) portions of 
Eastern Pennsylvania, including the counties of Bucks, 



THE SUN INN AT BETIILKTIf^r. 89 

Nortliomptoii and Berks, became the scene of popular 
excitement and even riotons proceedings. "A person 
was in the act of measuring the windows of a house," 
states the Aurora, a Democratic journal, in Philadelphia, 
"when a woman poured a shower of hot water on his head. 
Several of the assessors were intimidated from discharg- 
ing their duties, by threats of personal violence, until at 
last Government interfered." In Northampton county, 
which then included Lehigh, the malcontents were led on 
in these acts of aggression by one John Fries, whose cus- 
tom it was to harass the public officers, pursuing them 
from ph\ce to place, in companies of from fifty to sixty, 
all armed and with drum and fife. While at Quakertown 
on the 6th of March, learning that Marshal Nicholls 
would be at Bethlehem on the following day to take bonds 
for their appearance at the next Court from seventeen 
rioters whom he had arrested at various points. Fries 
resolved to effect their rescue. The people of Milford 
were invited to assist in the enterprise, and a paper set- 
ting forth their design was drawn up by their leader, and 
signed by his adherents then present. On the morning 
of the 7th of March, twenty or more of the rioters met at 
the house of Conrad Marks. Fries was armed with a 
sword, and had a feather in his hat. As they proceeded 
along the road they were met by young Marks, who told 
them they might as well turn about, as the people of 
Northampton were able to effect the rescue without the 
assistance of men from Bucks. Some, therefore, were 
inclined to do so, but at the instance of Fiies and others, 
they went forward. Meanwhile, however, another com- 
pany, intent upon the same errand, had arrived at the 



40 THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHEM. 

Bethlehem bridge, wliere they were met by a depiilation 
from the Marshal, advising them to return home. Here- 
upon they sent tliree of their number to that officer, to 
demand the unconditional release of his prisoners. While 
thus negotiating, Fries and his men, about noon, rode up 
to the bridge, arranged the toll, and calling upon the 
motley crowd, (there were upw-ards of tw^o hundred, some 
on horseback, some on foot, and some in the uniform of 
the Whitehall company,) to follow, they crossed the 
bridge, and to the sound of martial music, marched to 
The Sun. Here Fries, with the consent of his followers, 
demanded the prisoners, and when told by Nicholls that 
he could not surrender them, except they were taken from 
him by force, the bold chieftain harangued his men, stat- 
ing that this was the third day he had been out on the 
expedition, that he had had a skirmish the day before, 
and if the prisoners were not released he should have 
another that day. "Now you observe," he continued, 
"that force is necessary ; but yon must obey my orders. 
We will not go without taking the prisoners. But take 
my orders, you must not fire first, you must be fired upon, 
and when I am gone, you must do as well as you can, as 
I expect to be the first man that falls." He further de- 
clared to the Marshal that they would fight till a cloud of 
smoke prevented them seeing each other. Intimidated 
by this show of resistance, the prisoners were liberated, 
although they insisted on proceeding to Philadelphia to 
abide the decision of the law, and amid loud huzzas the 
insurgents dispersed. 

In April of this year "the stage was extended from 
Betlilehem to Easton, setting out every Monday and 



"THE SUN IKN AT l^ETIILEHEM. 41 

Thursday at half-past three A. M. from Jacob Opp's tav- 
ern in the hitter place, — the Sun tavern at Bethlehem at 
six o'clock, thence by way of Quakertown, and arriving 
at the Franklin Head on Second street in Philadelj^diia, 
-on the same evening. Fare from Bethlelwn^ to Plailadel- 
phia, $2.75." 

Eev. John C. Ogden, an Episcopal clei-gyman who 
visited Bethlehem during the last month of Mr. Levering's 
incumbency, has the following notice of on-r Inn : "It is 
a stone building, with four large rooms an the first, second 
and third floors. Those on the second and third floors are 
in part subdivided into two small and«a large room. In 
this way parties or gtnatlcmen with servants are accom- 
modated almost as separate families. Fifty persons may 
be quartered here conveniently." 

Mr. Levering retired from the Inn in Jnne of 1799, 
Subsequently he took charge of the estates of the Mora- 
vian congregation at Litiz, Lancaster county, whence he 
returned to Bethlehem circa 1832. Here he died in 
March of 1835, 

His successor at The Sun was 

John Lennert, whose administration of its concerns 
closed on the first of June, 1805. There is extant a 
waste-book kept by the clerk of the house for the years 
1801, 1802 and 1803, from which we extract the follow- 
ing memoranda, as illustrating the modes of travel in 
vogue in those days, and also the character of the guests 
whom business or pleasure was wont to bring to the Betli- 
lehem Inn : 

^'1801. Ju7ie 20.— A gentleman and a lady in a chair." 
6 



45i' THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHElVr. 

" 1801. t/une 24, — A family from Philadelpliia in a stage,, 
and driver." 
" Jul]/ 4. — A gentleman in the stage. One glats- 

af punch." 
"^ tltdy 8. — A eompanj in a stage with four horses 
and driver. Eight breakfasts, 8 dinners, 16 
suppers, 1 gin' spirits, 1 bottle porter, 2 pints 
Port. "£2. 18. 1." 

** July 12. — A lady dressed in black." 
" " 15. — A compan}^ of French gentlemen with 

a servant. Four suppers, 4 breakfasts, 4 
dinner^ 5 bottles porter, 2 bowls punch, 1 
pint Lisbon." 

"Two gentlemen in a craTicle, three hor- 
ses and one servant." 
*"^ July 2&. — A compan}'^ of ladies and gentlemen 
in a carriage. JV. B. — The ladies had a 
bottle of porter ever}'^ day at dinner," 
"^ Aug, 12. — A gentleman in a Windsor chair." 
" Aug. 26. — k. company from Maryland in chairs,, 
viz. : One gentleman, two children and one 
negro servant. Six suppers, 3 breakfasts, 3 
dinners, 2 glasses brandy, 2j: pints Tcnerifie,. 
1 glass sangaree." 
" Aug. 28. — A company of actors. Twelve sup- 
pers, 12 breakfasts, 9 dinners, 12 gills brandy." 
" Sept. 1. — A company in a Jersey wagon." 
" " 12. — A gentleman and a lady in a phaeton. '^ 

" Nov. 28. — General Lee, 6 horses and 4 servants. 
Five dinners, 1 bottle Madeira, 5 quarts beer, 
5^ pints brandy." 



THE SUH IXN AT T>ETKLEHEM. 43 

'-'1802. Ajnil 18. — A gentleman from Federal Citj in 
a stage." 
" June 4. — A gentleman and lady on horseback, 

4 horses and 1 servant." 
" June 30.— A company in a carriage, 3 liorses, 

2 black servants and one nurse." 
*' Aug. 22. — Mrs. Wade Hampton and two boys in 
a carriage, 2 horses and 1 servant. £14. 7. 1." 
*' Sept. 18. — The President of Cambridg-e Uni- 
versity." 
^' October 3.— A gentleman in a ' Sopus wagon.' " 

*' " 9. — Three Frencli gentlemen and one 

-servant." 
« *<• 20. — General Davis, Governor of North 

Carolina, one -child and negro servant, in 
chairs." 
*'1803. Jane 7. — Commodore Berry of the ship United 
States and negro sei-vant." 
" July 2d. — A gentleman and family of six chil- 
dren, two black girls and two drivers fron. 
Baltimore." 
Although much of the travel at this time was by j)ri- 
vate conveyance, the Sun was the house for a number of 
stages, among which are named Sellers', Stcehr's, Silas', 
Rinker"'s, and Peters'. 

Subsequent to his retirement from the Inn at Bethle- 
liem, Mr. Lenneii; removed to Salem, N. C, where he 
took charge of the house of entertainment, and where he 
died circa 1815. 



U TIIE SUX INN AT BETHLEHEM. 

Christian G. Paulas,* and Ann Jolianna, Las wife, were" 
liost and hoste&s of the Sun between June of 1805 and- 
June of 1811. The following were points, with their dis- 
tances, on " the lower" or Hollertown Road to Philadel- 
phia, at which the stages that traveled between Phila- 
delphia and Bethlehetn, were accustomed tO' stop in 
1809 :t 

"From Philadelphia to B. Davi&, 16 niiles^ 

" do'. Baptist Meeting, 23 " 

" do. Housekeeper's, 25 " 

" do. Swamp Meeting,.. ..38 " 

" do.. Stoifel Wagner's, |. .47 " 

do.. Bethlehem, 53 " "" 

.Joseph RicOy who conducted tlie Nazareth Inn fronii 
October of 1808 to June of 1811, succeeded Mr. Paulus 
at the Son, and in 1816 § wa& followed by 



* Mr. PawluB wJis a native of Neukirch, Saxony, whence he unnii- 
grated in 189o, and settled in Bethlehem. His wife was from Hope,, 
New Jersey. Both deceased at Bethlehem in the autumn of 1821. 

f Bi-itmeyer's German Americtux Almanac for 1809. Ocrmantoicn,. 
Pa. 

X Wagner's tavern, siibsecpently Woodring's, a short mile swith from 
Hellertown, was built in 1752, on a tract of 184 acres which was 
patented to Stoffel Wagner in June of that year by Thomas aiKl Eich- 
urd Penn. LaFayette stoi)i)ed at W^agner's on his way to Bethlehem 
after the battle of the Brandywiiie.- Old StofFel died circa 1812, up- 
wards of eighly years of age, and lies bui-ied at Apple's church near 
Leithsville, Mr. Charles Wagner, at the mill in Hellertow^l, is a great- 
grandson. 

? Mr. Bice died a* Bethlehem in October of 1831, 

It sliould here be stated,, that in the interval between 1SCX> aiwl 1817,, 
the Sun Avas the headquarters of one Nicliolas Kra^mer, Avho ran a 
brilliant career as a land specivlator, with Northampton and Lehigh 
t'ounties for the field of his bold operations. Krsemer was of humble- 
origin, without any education or means, — but gifted with genius for 
eombinations aiul witli nerve to assume the mast hajcardou-* risks. 



THE SUN INN .AT BETHLEHEM. 45 

Jacob Wolle, during whose administration the house 
was renovated, and materially changed in appearance, 
the Mansard roof being removed, a tliird story added, and 
the stone walls of the old building covered with a coat of 
rough-casting. 

The old public house at Hellertown is almost a fac 
simile of "The Sun," as it was as late as 1852. 

It must not be forgotten that Daniel Green, called 
Doctor Green, a man not unknown to fame, took up his 
abode at the Inn during this incumbency, and for full 
thirty years, entertained its guests in the capacity of 
cicerone. Mr. Wolle retired in April of 1827. He died 
at Bethlehem in April of 1863. 

Matthew Crist was his successor, and was the last sala- 
ried landlord employed by the Moravian Society. His 
administration closed in April of 1830. 

Henceforward, until the sale of the Inn in 1851, it was 
let for an annual rent to landlords, most of whom were not 
members of the Moravian Society. The first of these was 

These traits, when once he appeared before the public as a land-jobber, 
won for him its confidence and next its admiration, and in time homage 
was paid to him, as though he were a king. When in the zenith of his 
glory he resided at Nelighsville in Allen township, whence he would 
repair weekly to Bethlehem to hold court at the Sun Inn. On these 
occasions the house assumed the character of an exchange, its rooms 
and halls being crowded by the yeomanry of Northampton and the 
adjacent counties, all eager to buy or sell or barter, infatuated as mucli 
by the presence of Krsemer as by the excitement of the busy scene. 
Thousands of acres and tens of thousands of dollars passed hands almost 
reckless during the sessions of this novel court. So Knemer grew rich, 
and spending liberally for his subjects, (he kept free house at the Sun 
on court days,) the Inn drew revenue largely from his purse. But as 
the bubble grew in circumference, it grew thin, and then burst, and so 
it happened that Nicholas Kra>mer saw the day when the wreck of his 
fictitiously magnificent fortune was sold at sheriff's sale, and he died a 
poor man. 



46 THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHEM. 

George Atherton, between 1830 and 1838. lie was 
succeeded by George Ziegler, C. Edward Seidel, Preston 
Brock, Tilghman Rupp and George Shober. 

This brings us to the year 1851, in July of which year 
the old Sun Inn and its surroundings were sold by Philip 
H. Goepp, in behalf of the Moravians, to Charles A. 
Luckenbach, for $8,000. In September of the afore^ 
mentioned year the new proprietor sold an undivided half 
part of the property to John Anderson of New York, 
■whereupon the house was enlarged to its present dimen- 
sions, thoroughly renovated, and its management intrusted 
to 

.Tames Leibert, who in x4.pril of 1856 in turn became 
the proprietor of the now Sun Hotel, whose reputation 
he built up anew.* Mr. Leibert died in October of 1863. 

* A memorable day in his incumbency Avas Tuesday, November the 
8th, 1859, it being the occasion of the annual dinner of the Historical 
Society of Pennsylvania, when upwards of one hundred of its members 
sat down to discuss the following sumptuous bill of fare: 

D I N N E E 

FOR THE 

HISTOEICAL SOCIETY OF PENN'A., 

at the Sun Hotel, Bethlehem, Pa., 

(James Leibeet, Pboprietor,) 
Tuesday, November 8, 1859. 



SOUP. 
Calf's Head. 

FISH. 
Boiled Eock, Sauce Manocasy. 

ROAST. 

Eibs of Beef. Chickens. Domestic Ducks. Goose, Apple Sauce. 

Stuffed Turkey, Cranberry Sauce. Lamb with Jelly. 

Ham, Champagne Sauce. 



THE SUN INN AT BETHLEHEM. 47 

In April of 1864, Rnfus A. Grider purchased the house 
of C. A. Luckenbach, administrator of James Leibert, for 
$30,000, at an advance of $10,000. Mr. Grider con- 
ducted the house of which he was proprietor, for four 
years. 

Perhaps the most memorable day during this incum- 
bency was the 3d of November, 1865, it being the 
occasion of a dinner given by his friends to the Honorable 

HOT RELIEVES. 

Boiled Turkey, Oyster Sauce. Baked Calf's Head. 

COLD DISHES. 

Boned Turkey. Chicken Salad. Beef Tongue. 

Lobster Salad. Boiled Ham. 

RELISHES. 

Assorted Pickles. Worcestershire Sauce. Cold Slaw. 

Cranberry Sauce. Currant Jelly. French Mustard. 

Apple Sauce. Celery. Catsups. 

VEGETABLES. 

Turnips. Sweet Potatoes. Tomatoes. Baked Potatoes. Hominy. 
Egg Plants. Mashed Potatoes. 

GAME. 

Saddle of Venison. Canvas Back Ducks. Bed Head Ducks. 

Pheasants. Partridges on Toast. 

OKXAMENTAL. 

Pyramid of Maccaroni. 

PASTRY AKD PUDDIXGS. 

Mince Pie. Moravian Apple Cake. Bethlehem Streussel. Api)lo Pie. 

Moravian Sugar Cake. Pound Cake. Calf's Foot Jelly. 

Forms of Vanilla and Strawberry Ice Cream. 



Figs. Almonds. Kaisins. Grapes. Apples. Cheese 
Vanilla Ice Cream. Strawberiy Ice Cream. . 

Coffee and Tea. 



48 THE SUN INN AT BETIILEIIK:Nr. 

Asa Packer, of Maucli Chunk, upon the announcement of 
the founding by him of the Lehigh University. It is 
stated that the meeting represented in the aggregate 
$300,000,000 capital. 

In March, 1868, Mr. Grider sold the Sun Hotel to the 
present proprietor, Charles Brodhead, for $50,000. It 
Avas let by the latter to James E. Johnson, for a term of 
five years, but in November, 1868, Mr. Johnson assigned 
]iis lease to Messrs. Eiegel & Sandt, who managed the 
hotel for the remainder of the term. In April, 1873, 
Cyrus T. Smith, late of Towanda, Pa., leased the prop- 
erty, and he has since acceptably wielded the destinies of 
what was once, and for upwards of one hundred years, 
the old Sun Inn at Bethlehem. 



